Friday, June 17, 2011

To the Rocks With Love

If you were given the opportunity to leave a mark on the world, give advice to the lost, share unfathomable love, or plant a seed of positive thought into a complete stranger’s mind, wouldn’t you? At Bruce Bay, that chance is given to millions everyday; the chance to share your knowledge and advice, or merely to say “I was here”. At this bay, there are numerous small, white, wave eroded rocks on the beach that people retrieve, bring back to the rock wall that guards the road, write on them in sharpie, and proceed to leave them in a ten mile line (okay, piles) across the wall. As I wandered down the line of rocks, I mainly saw scribbles on them saying “Kate, I will always love you”, “New Zealand, March 2009”, “This beach is awesome”, “If you’re ever sad, think of Barney”, etc. My patience was about to run out, because even though these rocks were extremely interesting, none of them said anything with impact, passion, or even a real thought for that matter. I almost turned around, but I didn’t. I almost made my way down to the sand where everyone else was playing, but I didn’t. I almost made up my mind that these people had no heart, but I didn’t. I almost gave up, but I didn’t. I looked down at that last moment of internal calmness, and saw a rock. A rock that looked misplaced, with brown on the bottom and a chip off of it’s side, and it said “O Lord, you have searched me and You know me...if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there Your hand will guide me…” In that instant, I took back my notions about the people that had been there before me. Instead of judging the lack of passion in all of the other rocks’ words, I should have been focusing on changing the feel of the rocks by leaving my own  words with humility, yet power. After moving the meaningful rock into an interesting frame and photographing it (I put it back in the right place, I think), I walked on to the sandy beach and carefully picked out an almost perfect rock, snagged a sharpie, and carefully scrawled the phrase “water from a broken well will make you thirst again”. Although not every passerby will understand the phrase, I know that one day, someone will see my rock and think “I almost gave up, but I didn’t. I almost turned around, but I didn’t.”






"My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts," says the LORD. "And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine." 
          -Isaiah 55:8


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